Thursday, January 24, 2008

This week I had a standard Secret Theme round at Ray's and something a little different at Frank's. This is how a standard Secret Theme round works, as I copy and paste about once/week: Each group of 10 otherwise unrelated tough questions has a theme running through its answers. Can you answer the questions and figure out the themes? Answers will be posted early next week. And they will be, as always.

Ray's Happy Birthday Bar:

1) What's the Spanish word for "monkey"?2) What Prussian linguist and political philosopher wrote a defense of the Enlightenment in 1810 titled On the Limits of State Action?3) What NHL team did Wayne Gretzky play for 1988-1996?4) At what Swiss immigrant's homestead was gold discovered in California in 1848, igniting the California Gold Rush?5) What Hollywood starlet, who drank herself to death prematurely, apparently had her ashes turn up in a New York antique store in 2004?6) The recipe for what retro luncheon staple calls for crab meat, mayonnaise, Worcestershire sauce, and frequently butter and/or bread?7) What venerable learning institution was founded in Dublin, Ireland in 1592?8) Who has a bestseller with An Inconvenient Book?9) What model of Cadillac is named after a Latin American legend which dates to the 1530s?10) What soft drink brand was founded in Baltimore in 1889 and purchased by Sara Lee in the 1980s?

... and what theme links the ten answers?

At Frank's I mixed it up a little, seeing as I'm coming down with a cold (I feel better today than yesterday, thanks for asking) and wasn't sure how much talking I'd want to do. Actually, I was sure how much: I didn't want to do any talking. But that makes for a rotten quiz. So I threw together a printed round of 10 anagrams, and noted that the theme running through the ten was that they were names of people who had something in common. You got five points as always per correct answer, plus the usual eight bonus points for the theme. Note that although all of these names are broken into two words, they aren't all two-word names (most are), and letters from the first word do appear in the last name and vice versa.